POST CAMPAIGN THOUGHTS STRAT LAYER: Yeah well if you didn't google how intel works, good luck to you. I did cuz I expected something obtuse like this, so it was smooth on this end. Haven management feels very simplistic. Put everyone on intel if you wanna run missions in a region, if you don't put on recruit unless vigilance is high. For absolute minmaxing, swap everyone to recruit once you find 2 gops in the region. Do lib missions count towards the 2 gops limit? I know there's always a lib mission active in a region. Is avoiding full retals possible at all? I feel like it might be counterproductive since you need Str4 and Vig4 (?) to get a full retal, and you want troop columns that start spawning at str4 for corpses. Intel retal is whatever. I don't see a reason why you'd ever provoke a recruit or supply retal. Resources are very tight early game (sounds familiar lmfao). Sell elerium cores. Basic weapon upgrades that aren't stocks and scopes feel quite unnecessary then, just sell them all. Probably sell advanced ones as well. Elite I'm not sure. I was very tight on resources in March because I immediately bought an Engineer and a Scientist. Not sure if this is always the correct play, at least regarding the Scientist. Engineer excavates for you so he pays for himself plus change after 2 rooms which you're gonna do anyway. But faster laser/mag is also good right? Not sure if it's "correct" to pursue another liberation after the first one. You don't *need* to, but extra resources during the mag/coil crunch are very welcome. You can trade them for elerium/alloys too via BM. Maybe it is because you're gonna expand to blacksite which is almost always 4 regions (?) away anyway, so might as well get one more lib out while you're stockpiling the intel you need to expand. Once blacksite is available, aggressively pursuing Chosen and golden path seems to be the way. Gops don't do anything except for giving you resources, so you should convert resources into actual progress. Chosen need 3 MSGTs to take down. That's probably gonna be from the squad that went on the HQ assault(s) and the blacksite. I found that after my 2 HQ assaults and the blacksite, I was close to getting the 3 MSGTs, so I just went after them. TAC LAYER: I miss my shotguns. No longer can I get those ~80%++ cleanup shots from 5-6 tiles away through cover earlygame. Instead I wound up using swords. Super high accuracy chops ignoring cover are great for killing off advent stragglers. They also oneshot sectoids. Grenades are a lot more valuable since you don't get corpses anyway so just bomb them. Yeah you lose loot which is kinda bad since that's supplies, but once you get Vulture you'll get it all back anyway. Vipers are cursed. Spitting on someone means they're in the medbay almost guaranteed. That plus decent base aim makes them infuriating to deal with. The hardest part of the game for me was when triple snake pods start showing up and I don't have mag-tier damage on everyone to nuke them all turn 1. Somehow, snakes are still nowhere as bad as fucking priests. Advent priests are the goddamn devil. Their weapon does decent damage, they can give a bunch of stat boosts and ablative to an ayy, which you can fortunately deal with by killing the priest. However, they can also stasis one of your soldiers, and it's somehow always the most important one. You literally can't do anything about it. Not even killing the priest works. Speaking of killing the priest, those fuckers don't even die when they are killed unless you skullmine them. Higher rank priests have a higher chance of going into death stasis, and the only thing you can do about it is bladestorm/ccs which is also unreliable since OW penalty applies to them. CCS doesn't even work if the priest chooses to shoot, but they usually run if they're flanked. Oh right these assholes come with solace aura too so you can't sting grenade or taser them or flashbang. You have to burn them, and incendiary grenades aren't even 100%. In those 2-3 man pods in extremely light gops, priests are whatever. But when they're in those massive 8 man advent pods on HQs, or on supply raids when another pod patrols into you, they can really fuck you up by deleting one soldier from your squad. Other than snakes and priests, there aren't really any other enemies that jump out at me as being extremely dangerous. Mutons, including centurions and elites, can be controlled by using a combatives shinobi. Elites and centurions don't always run straight at them to bayonet though, if the shinobi isn't right next to them. Same for archons, but you have to provoke them into trying to whack you first. Assorted elite advent are nasty, but they're vulnerable to all types of control (UNLESS THEY'RE ACCOMPANIED BY A PRIEST LUL) so they're *usually* not a problem. They're somewhere between muton centurions and muton elites in difficulty. Skullmining instantly kills them too, but its a 70% roll. Andromedons, sectopods, gatekeepers can all be scary but they tend to come too late. By then XCOM's power level should be high enough that you can handle them so long as you aren't fighting 3 pods at once, and sometimes even then you can be fine. SQUAD BUILDING: I run 5 man teams for gops. One of them is always a shinobi (see below). In a squad, I'm looking for: Scouting Single target damage/Hack Control Aoe damage Roughly in that order. Shinobi fills scouting and single target, and sometimes control. So the remaining 4 need to fill the rest. SHINOBI: Built them mostly as sword/scout hybrids. Took Covert, everything else was sword. I did try Ghostwalker on a couple guys, but the lack of reliability when finishing dodgier ayys like snakes or archons made me prefer Blademaster in the end. I brought one on almost every mission. The only times I didn't were when there were none available in the barracks. I could have used one or two more shinobis. They're walking battlescanners, and they are very capable fighters too when the time comes. Combatives lets them control some very dangerous enemies, while Blademaster Fleche is a very reliable finisher through the entire game. Reaper's also good at cleaning up. I definitely got most of my Reaper use lategame when 6 or 7 ayy pods show up, and they have a total hp of like 100. My shinobi corps had a lot of overlap with my officer corps. I tried technical and grenadier officers, but I feel like shinobis have the most free turns to command with since they are walking battlescanners most of the time and won't fight until you need it. Never leave home without one. 8/8 rating. SPECIALIST: I did not build enough specialists. I had all of *two* in my lategame barracks, and that was not enough. I think I'd need closer to 5. All of mine (2 lol) were hacker spec. On extremely light gops you shouldn't need medkits, and you can pick Field Medic instead of Airdrop if you want some extra medkits on big missions. Not sure if revival protocol is ever useful enough to pick over combat. Usually mental effects are applied via sectoid, so you can flash or kill it. Combat protocol helps with that. Interference might be worth picking over Field Surgeon? I'm thinking of those mid-lategame mec pods where they go into overwatch on activation. But if they do you have Haywire anyway right? By that point in the game you have Gremlin 2 and skullmining so you can pretty reliably shut down, and probably even control too. Trojan means you don't need to suffer from random patrolling drones for most of the game. Also neuters most mecs. Scanning protocol is super good for lids and the Assassin though. Might be worth taking maybe? Not sure if OW build is ever worth. They are probably really strong early and midgame, but you miss out on Failsafe to take ~~Opportunist~~ CUP which is kinda... Also, hackermen can actually give you resources by hacking towers/chests. This alone is enough of a reason to bring them every mission. Almost never leave home without one. 7/8. GUNNER: I built too many gunners. I had like 5 but I wound up using like 3. All of them were shooty build that took Lockdown at Cpl. This was cuz I'd played LW1 and I expected fat mech to show up eventually, and the answer to that is multishot with the most powerful gun available to XCOM. There's no bullet wizard mayhem shred with holo in lw2, and I noticed that suppression is super unreliable since sometimes they escape by moving 1 tile and then sprinting out of vision. Area suppression is even more wonky, I have no idea how that works at all except sometimes they run and they don't get shot at. That said, I took Lockdown because Flush is incredibly unappealing, I didn't see the need for Formidable, and Lockdown helps earlygame when your flank shots are unreliable, so you can flank, miss, and then still have a buffed Suppression overwatch shot when they inevitably run. Took Shredder at Sgt. The opportunity cost of taking Hail of Bullets here... You need shred one way or another, and having it on Gunners makes fat boys like Sectopods and Gatekeepers a lot easier to deal with. I took Rupture at GSgt, but never used it. I preferred Cyclic Fire or Chain Shot to shred armour on targets that would warrant a Rupture. Next time I'd probably take Rapid Fire on everyone, or Kill Zone for ambushes. I can see both being useful. Saturation Fire is an amazing ambush skill. But if you took Kill Zone I think Traverse Fire is probably better? They do similar things. I used these as one of my main single target damage dealers. 5-6/8, tied with... RANGERS: Only shooty build rangers here. I dislike the OW build due to lack of control. Sawn off build seems like a meme. Maybe on an 18 mob soldier with no aim. I actually did have one of these, but I turned her into a Shinobi. Mistake, because her sword was unreliable. A lot of problems fixed from LW1 imo, but most of that is locked behind ranks. I feel like shooty ranger only really comes into its own past Cpl when you get Locked On. Walk Fire/Locked On/LEU lets you force through most cover by sheer volume of fire and aim bonuses. Exec being +20 instead of 10 helps even more if you land that first shot, or if ayys have been softened up by explosives. Centre Mass over Aggression, Aggression is nerfed and... I don't think you ever take BEO over Implacable at TSgt. Implacable makes the ranger a lot more flexible. They can shoot > move > shoot, or shoot > shoot > move, which patches up the mobility issue they had. At high ranks, Shoot > Rapid Fire lets you brute force through cover. Important since sometimes you really cannot afford to move at all because of pod placement. I took Combat Fitness over Rupture, since I assumed Gunners would rupture. I was wrong on this count. Maybe if Gunners brought Traverse Fire... Rangers still do have some damage issues though. They rely heavily on tech. They're more reliable than Gunners at the expense of dealing less damage, unless you roll Lethal on xcom row or something. My top Ranger did, by the way. Final rating 5-6/8 tied with Gunners. On big missions, I brought both. GRENADIER: I undervalued these, because cover destruction with grenades is not reliable at all: I could only get it to work on soft objects like fences or tables at ground zero even with Sapper. I'll still take Sapper, since not all cover is hard, but Rapid Deployment could be good for officers. However, Sting Grenades and Bluescreen Bombs are incredible. Combined with Volatile Mix, you can get some really garbage triple pod activations and still come out fine because your Grenadier just stunned half of them. Ridiculous. Full Kit vs Ghost Grenade is super contentious I feel. Full Kit lets you just throw Sting Grenades around like a madman, but concealment is incredibly strong if you have one-man ambush skills, like Kill Zone or Shadowstrike/Saturation Fire. Smoke I feel is giga nerfed from LW1 too. Smoke can be blocked by some cover, and some dangerous enemies don't care that much. Stun Lancers... I'd rate them 4/8. It's super close between them and Gunners/Rangers though. Maybe they should just all share one spot. I would always bring them if I had the space. ASSAULT: Please man, give me back my shotguns. They're completely unreliable 4-5 tiles out without a flank, and 6-8 tiles out even with one. I ended up turning all my assaults into tasermen. That way they had something to do while closing in. Run gun isn't always up, and sometimes you don't wanna use it even when it is due to extra pods. Electroshock over Lightning Reflexes is a mistake though. Disorient isn't high value mid to lategame, and I'd rather be able to run more overwatches. Sometimes you have to. It's also more valuable on higher difficulties, since the chance of yellow alert actions is higher afaik? I took Aggression over Extra Conditioning. A mistake in hindsight, since Aggression was nerfed. XEW Aggression would have made my build a fine hybrid, but not now. That said, I still took Rapid Fire. Although the only thing it really does is kill Codices and Avatars I guess? Don't know if it's important enough to warrant taking over Close Encounters or HnR. 2-3/8 overall, tied with... SHARPSHOOTERS: Aka snipers. I had two, and they were both DFA. Is Snap Shot competitive enough with Rangers or Gunners? It didn't seem that way initially for me, so I chose to take DFA and then have a backup for her. Very straightforward build. Ended with Double Tap at MSgt. Took Disabling Shot at GSgt for those crappy scenarios. It was useful when I needed it. Holo build seems interesting. Maybe as an officer? Next run. I felt that their peak was midgame when Mag and Coil were fresh and new. That gives them a window where they reliably one tap ayys so they can keep steadying for extremely reliable shots through cover if they have high ground. Before that, they're kind of dead weights. Hard to train up early game. Give them grenades and have them holo/nade I guess. After that, ayy hp scales pretty hard and its difficult for them to reliably get one taps. Still provide good reliable damage though. Also, they can cheese destroy relay missions. ALways bring one on those. 2-3/8 overall. Pretty crap on most gops, but invaluable on HQ assaults or other untimed golden path missions. TECHNICAL: I don't know what to say here. They felt bad the entire run. The only thing they do is rocket. Sure, that's great, but they only get 1 (2 when exo suit is up). Is that worth a slot? Maybe early when things die to rocket and they can bring nades to nade crappy advent troopers with. The rocket aoe is huge, but most of the time I just found myself praying it didn't scatter and blow up my own soldiers. Talk about double-edged sword... They have a flamethrower, but it's pathetic. Cmon man, 2-5 damage tier 1 doesn't even kill advent troopers 100% of the time. It doesn't 100% burn either. With that crap range, at least give me one of the two, not neither. Even with a SMG it's hard to get into range. Mag tier gauntlet gives +2 damage, but by then most ayy's health pools have outscaled the +2 damage. I'm looking at snakes, which require a high roll to oneshot even on Veteran. Or a crit from Biggest Booms. Does it get better with T3 gauntlet? No idea, because I didn't research Battlesuits. Maybe I played these wrong. Instead of trying to use the crappy flamethrower, I should just give them rifles and give them Shredder. 1/8. Can someone tell me if they actually are any good? SPARK: I thought these would be crap, but I was.. pleasantly surprised! I think you always take Adaptive Aim at first rank. Formidable is great for helping to tank, but you're relying on that Overdrive to get you through hell turns, and you want those shots from the SPARK's huge gun to hit. Especially if you take Shredder. Speaking of Shredder, I think it might be pretty competitive to Rainmaker at rank 2. I took Rainmaker on my only SPARK this run since I had Shredder on gunners. Rainmaker helps the Spark carry hard in gops. Even the basic Shredder Gun is doing 6-11 with Rainmaker, with a bigger aoe too. I never got Shredstorm Cannons, no idea what gives those. Plasma blasters come late but are absolutely hilarious. Most fun I've had in LWOTC. Rainmaker Plasma Blaster can really bail you out of hard spots. I think the main reason I'm so iffy on Technicals is because Rainmaker Spark obliterates ayys. When I felt like I badly needed cover destruction because funny enemies like Muton Elites were showing up with 25 base defense, I leaned towards the Plasma Blaster's reliability and sheer damage over the Technical's rocket. My Spark obsoleted them. After this, I built my spark as a gunner, diverting to take Repair instead of Sentinel and then Damage Control later. Also took CUP and then Hunter Protocol. I wound up with a decently shooty unit since the spark gun gives aim/crit. Outside of hell turns, it could shoot with decent reliability and high damage that also holotargeted. During hell turns, it overdrives and shoots three times, or plasma blasts and then shoots twice. Not sure if building more than one is worth though. It's a weird catch-22, since if you build equipment only for one unit, it's expensive, but building a new spark is also expensive. SKIRMISHER: Of the 3 hero classes, I feel like the Skirmisher is the weakest. Not that that means they aren't strong. They have lots of multishot, starting with Hit and Run. However, I felt like I was always staring down 80-90% shots. For how risky the Skirmisher has to play to get results, that slowly soured me on them. That's on top of subpar damage. Until Lethal at MSgt, it felt like I was always needing to rely on a crit. I packed Talon Rounds and tried to keep it up with Get Some from officers, but that doesn't always give 100%. Not sure if Implacable over Chain Shot is correct at Sgt. I think Chain Shot probably is better, but that extra -10 aim is like... the Skirmisher has some trouble hitting already. And you don't get the second shot if the first misses. Close Encounters definitely the pick at GSgt I think? It allows Skirmishers to get actions off unflankable ayys like Berserkers and MECs, but it's also 25 AP, and the Skirmisher has some really nice XCOM perks. REAPER: Didn't try the knife build, but the rifle build Reaper was a mainstay in my mid-lategame squads once I got her. Being able to track enemies through walls is super great since it removes the chance of your shinobi getting detected. It happens sometimes still, even once you've learned the tricks to staying hidden. Blood Trail > Shooting Sharp and the innate +10 aim from Vektors makes the Reaper fairly reliable at shooting into cover when you first get them. They do decent damage too if they've been hit in the same turn thanks to Blood Trail. Silent Killer vs Ghost Grenade is hard though. Concealment is incredible, but so is Silent Killer when the build comes together. I think you can pick both. SSgt might be a skip tier for the AP. If you have Implacable in XCOM row, probably skip since ***** Shot gives similar functionality. Bluescreen Knives could be interesting. Death Dealer at TSgt ties the build together imo. Banish has lots of aim penalties, meaning you need a lot of support for the Reaper to delete that one enemy. You could probably have done the same using another soldier in that case. Meanwhile, Death Dealer means the Reaper can Phantom, flank, then shoot to kill. On a crit, the ayy is almost certainly dead, and the Reaper maintains Phantom with Silent Killer, keeping them safe. Death Dealer also makes squadsight flanking kills a lot more reliable with 25 crit chance even outside of Phantom. LEU at GSgt means the Reaper can now shoot twice while flanking with Phantom. With ***** Shot procced they can even do the shoot > move > shoot, or shoot > shoot move. All the MSgt perks look good. I went with Homing Mine for ambushes, but I think in the end DFA or even Rend the Marked might have been more useful the way I played. I wound up using my Reaper like a somewhat less mobile Skirmisher that had way more range and had a lot more explosive damage. I definitely prefer this Reaper over the Skirmisher. TEMPLAR: The best for last. Templars are completely absurd. Imagine a soldier that can inflict extremely reliable damage, draws fire from the rest of your squad, manipulates the AI, and more or less never goes into the medbay! Ridiculous! I really don't have much to say here. Indomitable, Crusader's Rage, then take whatever else you want as long as you take those two. Impact Compensation is also a very strong pick. The base kit of the Templar is so stupidly strong that it's hard to make a bad Templar. Every mission I thought was gonna be hard, I brought the Templar. I was never disappointed.